The M Room

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The M Room

Subjects EnglishHistory

Age Groups KS3KS4

Publisher LGfLNEN

The M Room resource gives exclusive access to secret World War II listening sites where the British Secret Service bugged high-ranking German Military prisoners. The resource features an interview with one of the original secret listeners and extensive primary-source material from the Ministry of Defence, relatives of those involved, and The National Archives.

The lead presenter and consultant to the project is the eminent historian Dr Helen Fry. The depth and range of material in the resource is a result of Helen’s meticulous research at The National Archives, with relatives, and out ‘on location’: she uncovered information about The M Room story that even the Ministry of Defence was unaware of.

The resource features 50 high-quality video clips filmed on location at declassified military sites, as well as over 50 high-resolution images of locations, personnel, maps and previously classified documents. The skeuomorphic design of the site makes students feel that they are sat at Colonel Kendrick desk themselves, working to make sense of all the primary-source information on which millions of lives depend.

Produced in response to the revised secondary National Curriculum, The M Room specifically targets the revised Key Stage 3 History curriculum section ‘Challenges to Britain, Europe and the wider world from 1901 to present day’, picking up on the suggested focus of ‘the Second World War and the wartime leadership of Winston Churchill’. The London Grid for Learning (LGfL) resource also features relevant sections on Nazi atrocities, linking to the statutory requirement to cover the Holocaust at KS3, as well as incorporating curriculum-linked activities for the KS3/4 Literacy curriculum.

Perhaps the most compelling aspect of the resource is the way in which Dr Helen Fry models how primary-source material is used to build an understanding of the past.